Sprout Social https://sproutsocial.com/insights/ Sprout Social offers a suite of <a href="/features/" class="fw-bold">social media solutions</a> that supports organizations and agencies in extending their reach, amplifying their brands and creating real connections with their audiences. Wed, 15 Nov 2023 15:45:51 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://media.sproutsocial.com/uploads/2020/06/cropped-Sprout-Leaf-32x32.png Sprout Social https://sproutsocial.com/insights/ 32 32 3 analog skills every social media manager needs, from one who’s been in the field 12+ years https://sproutsocial.com/insights/analog-skills-every-social-media-manager-should-have/ Wed, 15 Nov 2023 15:45:51 +0000 https://sproutsocial.com/insights/?p=178981 I wasn’t always a social media manager. I started my career as a TV reporter, then worked for a company’s in-house public affairs department, Read more...

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]]> I wasn’t always a social media manager. I started my career as a TV reporter, then worked for a company’s in-house public affairs department, before managing social media professionally. So, I know first-hand how interactions with coworkers and leadership within a company differ when you’re not a social media manager versus when you are one. It’s fascinating really.

When I was TV reporter, no one ever confidently presumed they could do my job, or gave me tips on how I could do my job better. When I worked in the public affairs department, there was absolutely no chance of a vice president or the president’s team emailing me directly about something at work, and certainly not on a weekend. Being a social media manager can sometimes feel like no one knows who you are or cares about what you’re doing until something happens—and then all of a sudden everyone knows who you are and are deeply invested in what you’re doing.

After years of having some of the same encounters with people repeatedly, I’m going to share some of the skills you might not realize you need as a social media manager and could help you experience career longevity in this profession.

1. Build trust across generational gaps

This is certainly not an absolute, but social media strategists and managers tend to skew younger than their supervisors and leadership within the organization. It’s safe to guess the supervisors and leadership also didn’t grow up with social media, and many of them are not avid users. While social media has been with us for more than 20 years and has become a sophisticated revenue generating industry, some still hold the belief that social media is primarily for kids.

Any skepticism held against the position will naturally spill over to skepticism of the person in the role, creating a more challenging environment to build trust. But like all relationship building, it takes time and effort, and one of the most effective ways to do this as a social media manager is through data.

Share data early and often with your superiors. This not only gives you an opportunity to demonstrate that you know what you’re doing, it gives them a chance to see your name in their inboxes and become familiar with who you are. This might be in the form of monthly reports, or weekly updates, or a quick follow up on a particular post or campaign of interest. Even better if you can work out monthly or quarterly in-person or virtual meetings with your department leaders (the most effective way to share metrics with leadership, according to The 2023 Sprout Social Index™). Share good new first, then they’re more likely to listen or seek your recommendations when the news is not good or when the company is in the midst of a social media crisis.

A chart sharing the most effective ways to share metrics with the executive team. 1). In-person meetings or presntations, 2). Dashboards, 3). Formal static reports or scheduled standups, 4). email summaries or updates, 5). project management tools and 6). marketing mix modeling

2. Embrace the revolving door of explanations

I can’t remember the countless number of times I’ve had to explain why a flyer or a PDF is not acceptable content for social media (and sometimes to the same person). Lately people have been asking me the same questions about X. “What’s your strategy?,” “What do you think about the latest changes?” etc.

You will find yourself having the same conversations over and over again as a social media manager. But remember, you’re the expert, and they value your opinion, or at least the channel you manage, which is why they’re coming to you in the first place.

Educating others is a huge part of being a social media manager, and one I take very seriously. While you’ve heard yourself explaining the same thing time and again it’s most likely the first time they’ve heard it. For some folks, social media is very unfamiliar and how you respond to basic questions could make them have an adverse reaction toward social media as a whole. Remember, we want to be strong ambassadors for the profession.

3. Capitalize on teachable moments

As the keeper of the “keys” to a brand’s social media accounts, social media managers are inundated with requests to posts things. Sometimes, people will make helpful suggestions and offer great content. Other times, not so much. Each of the “not so much” examples are teachable moments. Instead of responding with “No, sorry…,” and coming across like a gatekeeper, lead with “Thank you for sharing, but this is not a fit…” and communicate why. The next time they make a request, it might be the exact thing you’re looking for and you’ve gained a content partner in the process.

Another frequent request (often demand) many social media managers have to navigate is to establish a presence on yet another new channel. Those who don’t directly manage the brand’s social media channels often see the latest emerging platform as something that must be jumped on rather than thinking it through, assuming more is better when it comes to social. But it’s your responsibility to be strategic about the platforms your brand chooses to be active on. Ask specific questions of your colleagues and leadership to facilitate this reoccurring discussion.

Continuing the conversation

In my upcoming book, “Organic Social Media, How to Build Flourishing Online Communities,” you’ll find more conversational guides on how to approach these situations, and more tips on building trust and managing up. I also have an entire chapter on choosing the right platforms. My goal is to help you enjoy a long and successful career in this profession.

Looking for more guidance to elevate your social media career? Join The Arboretum, Sprout’s member-driven virtual community built by social media and marketing professionals.

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]]> What to expect from social media management in 2028 https://sproutsocial.com/insights/what-to-expect-from-social-media-management-in-2028/ Wed, 15 Nov 2023 14:26:19 +0000 https://sproutsocial.com/insights/?p=179264 Thinking back on what social media management meant a decade ago, the word that comes to mind is tactical. When brands first started using Read more...

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]]> Thinking back on what social media management meant a decade ago, the word that comes to mind is tactical. When brands first started using social media, it was mainly for publishing content and light community engagement. For some it was an experiment. For many, a chore to be left for the intern who “got it.”

Social was built originally for consumers, not businesses or teams, and we set out to build the software for any organization to be successful. Our early product helped social teams build content calendars, find and respond to relevant comments, publish posts across multiple channels with ease, and track proxy metrics of success (remember Klout scores?).

Over time, social activity ballooned, matured and fractured as new networks, content formats and communities emerged. Consumer usage became mainstream and multi-generational. Brands’ investment in social began to reflect this wider and more committed adoption. Today, more than 4.9 billion people worldwide use social media, and 53% of consumers have increased their social media usage over the past two years. Social ad spending in the US alone is expected to surpass $80 billion by 2025. None of these patterns show signs of reversing course.

Consumers now see social as a connection to the companies and causes they care about—a faster, richer experience than support@ email addresses and 1-800 numbers. No longer just a frontier marketing or niche conversational channel, social is fast becoming the nexus of customer relationships and the primary digital face of brands.

What does that mean for the next generation of social media management solutions? 
Brands will need more than just the next iteration of tools. Simply responding to more customers, publishing on more networks and sharing raw data across teams, will only go so far.

As consumers increasingly make social the digital hubs of their lives, brands have the chance to understand their audiences and markets deeply, and to spread that knowledge throughout their organization. Social media management solutions will evolve into the thread that connects and strengthens the bonds between brands and consumers—woven throughout every team, strategy and customer experience.

The next generation of business on social is not particularly about “social” at all. It’s about real digital customer relationships.

Customer intelligence is converging on social

We’ve seen how social customer care has changed the way marketing and customer support teams operate. Years ago they may not have had a reason to interact or share information regularly, but social media has made them close collaborators out of necessity. As social becomes the primary hub for high-resolution consumer insights, imagine how other departments could transform their work.

Consider the speed and richness of customer information you can glean from social compared to channels like email or phone. Social content is immediate, continuous and more fully represents the person. Email, phone and other channels are far more asynchronous—frustratingly for days with email—and are episodic, giving a limited view of the customer. An Instagram Story reply happens in real time whereas an email might go unread for days, or weeks. Who a customer follows on X (formerly Twitter) and interacts with says a lot more about who they are as a person compared to one service representative’s short conversation on a support call.

Green data visualization citing Sprout Social Index data that 53% of consumers say their social media usage has increased over the last two years compared to the previous two

With people putting more and more of their lives online—including their lives as customers—social data is becoming the core representation of the customer. This impacts and benefits every team, even when they’re not on the front lines of social. We’re seeing departments like recruiting, legal and product asking to get involved in social, a reality I never anticipated seeing when we started Sprout over a decade ago.

At the same time, social is becoming more complex. Brands need to factor in how quickly social is fragmenting and morphing across emerging platforms and evolving consumer preferences. More social networks to choose from means consumers are exposed to a wider set of perspectives (be them other users, influencers or businesses), making it crucial for brands to demonstrate they understand what their audience wants in each space.

This growing bounty of intelligence means social media will continue to supplant traditional market and customer research, as well as legacy customer records. But businesses need tools that can aggregate, disseminate and analyze social data at scale and across the organization, before it decays—whether that’s because the opportunity passed, preferences already shifted or a competitor acted first.

This will take advanced, yet elegant, technology. Simply increasing budgets and manpower won’t help brands capitalize on the opportunities social media brings to the table. For brands to consistently deliver the exceptional experiences consumers expect, and to fully realize the emerging opportunity to know the customer, social media management solutions will need to become more accessible, intuitive and purpose-built for every team.

The future of social media management is…

With each emerging generation and as new platforms come online, social will only become further ingrained into both society and, in the business world, every workflow and team. Whether that’s directly interacting with a customer or applying audience insights to the business, social media is the front-line for customer relationships and market intelligence. It’s where your brand, reputation and opportunity exists.

Graphic explaining how the future of social media management tools will be ubiquitous, personalized, intelligent and interoperable.

For organizations to be truly customer-centric, the future of social media management solutions must be built with these four pillars in mind:

1. Ubiquitous. With social becoming the kernel of the customer record, social media management solutions will need to become accessible and consumable by every team. That doesn’t mean your sales team is suddenly going to be posting Reels. Rather, democratizing access to your social management platform means upleveling data and insights for specific departments, business processes and decision makers.

Today, only the most forward-thinking companies share social media insights pervasively within their organizations. Tomorrow, this will be table stakes. We’ll know we’ve entered the next era when all teams see social data as critical to competitively addressing customer, product and business opportunities.

2. Personalized. While brands aren’t rushing to remove traditional channels like phone and email from their communication strategies, social is raising the bar for how and when they engage with their audience. Consumers don’t just want brands to respond to them on social; 70% of them expect companies to solve their problem in a personalized manner. But “personalization” has to mean more than populating dynamic fields with standard name or location inputs.

Younger generations, in particular, bring any and all issues to brands on social, assuming they’ll be met with swift and authentic interactions. They expect the people behind the brand account to treat them the way they’d be treated walking into a local, independently owned shop: with empathy and acknowledgement of their individual preferences. With powerful social media management tools that intuitively surface the context they brands need to truly know each customer on this level, they can engage accordingly.

3. Intelligent. Expecting teams to manually collate massive amounts of social listening data and transform it into actionable recommendations takes time away from their core work. Departments need answers, not more chores. With AI innovation, expect to see social media management solutions to automate and elevate how social data is used across teams. AI and automation can, for example, present recommendations that empower brands to create highly personalized experiences in no time at all. Beyond saving time and resources, AI advancements in social media management solutions will enable teams to build relationships that influence revenue and loyalty at scale.

4. Interoperable. Customer relationships start, grow and expand on social. So it’s unsurprising that 96% of business leaders expect social data to be integrated into their organization’s CRM capabilities over the next three years. But integration is just the beginning.

It’s not enough to simply grant every department access to social data. Social media management solutions should process, package and seamlessly integrate data with the entirety of your organization’s tech stack. Social media management tools will become the go-to source that every team uses for immediate, in-depth market insights and customer intelligence.

The social media management solutions of tomorrow will be designed with every team in mind

Thirteen years ago at Sprout, we started by helping social teams simplify the tactical functions bogging down their workdays. We strove to empower social marketers, often working in teams of one, giving them the tools needed to keep up with the publishing and engagement responsibilities of their job.

But consumers expect more from brands now as social increasingly becomes the digital hub of their lives. The future of customer experience and understanding starts and ends with social. And social media management solutions must evolve to be more than an island, but a primary source purpose-built for every team to harness consumer insights and build deeper relationships.

For more perspective into how consumers’ social media behaviors and expectations are evolving, download The Sprout Social Index™ today.

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]]> Mastering Instagram influencer marketing: strategies for success https://sproutsocial.com/insights/instagram-influencer-marketing/ Tue, 14 Nov 2023 16:54:41 +0000 https://sproutsocial.com/insights/?p=162183/ The influencer space has ballooned into a multi-billion dollar phenomenon, meaning influencer marketing has made its name as a key marketing strategy. Brands of Read more...

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]]> The influencer space has ballooned into a multi-billion dollar phenomenon, meaning influencer marketing has made its name as a key marketing strategy. Brands of all shapes and sizes are eager to find ways to feature creators in their campaigns.

Instagram is quickly becoming the go-to network for influencers, with recent stats saying that carousels, Reels and Stories are among the most popular content types for creators.

As creators continue to dominate the platform, brands need to know how Instagram influencer marketing works. In this post, we’ll break down the basics.

What is Instagram influencer marketing?

Instagram influencer marketing is a promotional strategy based on partnerships between brands and social media creators (“influencers”) on Instagram.

The concept is simple enough. Brands partner with creators to promote products on their Instagram profiles and then compensate those creators for their efforts. And while influencer marketing is popular on many platforms (like TikTok and Facebook), 86% of social marketers cite Instagram as the top platform for their influencer marketing strategy.

What makes someone an Instagram influencer, though?

The term refers to the level of influence that these social media creators have on their audiences. That’s because everyday consumers look to influencers for product recommendations.

In short, influencers are users that influence purchasing decisions. One-third of people on Instagram have been inspired to buy something based on an influencer’s post.

Most Instagram influencers don’t actually refer to themselves by the term, though. Creator or content creator is more common these days. Although influencer used to be synonymous with celebrity, times have changed.

You don’t need millions of followers to be considered an Instagram influencer. There are different levels of influencer, which can be broken down into the categories below:

And while 70% of social marketers see the biggest impact from macro-influencers, 43% also see a huge impact from micro-influencers.

What are some examples of Instagram influencer marketing?

Chances are you’ve encountered your fair share of Instagram influencers in the wild. Below are a few examples of influencer content in action.

Sponsored content (#ad or #gifted posts)

Sponsored posts are disclosed by creators with a tag such as #ad or #gifted if they were given the product for free. Through gifting, brands provide creators with free products in exchange for a post. Sometimes additional compensation is also offered.

Below is an example from BoxyCharm. Frequent sponsored and gifting campaigns makes their beauty products practically can’t-miss on Instagram.

Screenshot of Instagram influencer marketing gifted products example by hashtag.

Affiliate links

Many brands boast affiliate programs on Instagram. When someone clicks on an influencer’s affiliate link, that interaction is tracked. The affiliate is compensated if the person that clicked converts.

If you’ve ever seen the phrase “link in bio” when referring to a product, you’re likely looking at an affiliate post. Many influencers will also have static affiliate links in their bios through Instagram tools like Linkt.ree.

Screenshot of Instagram influencer marketing linktree example.

Reposting Instagram influencer content

Brands will often supplement their own Instagram content strategy with posts from influencers.

For example, a company might reshare an influencer’s photo shouting a product to their stories feed. Mixed with organic content and customer tags, the influencers’ posts fit in seamlessly.

What are the benefits of Instagram influencer marketing?

So, why are influencer relationships worth the time and effort? Below we highlight the key benefits for brands.

Greater reach and exposure

Brand accounts have been hit hard by the Instagram algorithm when it comes to reach and engagement.

On the flip side, creator accounts are thriving. Influencers often boast some of the most engaged-with posts you can find on Instagram.

But beyond that, also consider that influencers can boost the exposure of brands by introducing them to a larger audience. For example, check out Hero Cosmetics’ 104,000 followers…

 

Screenshot of an Instagram brand bio example.

…and the creator they partnered with that currently has an audience three times that size.

Screenshot of an Instagram influencer marketing bio example.

See how that works? Especially for up-and-coming brands, influencers serve as an alternative to Instagram ads.

Increase social sales

Again, Instagram influencers represent an advertising channel for brands beyond traditional paid posts.

Collaborations, ambassadorships and product gifting can be more cost-effective than conversion-based campaigns.

There are tons of question marks around paid ad targeting. Through Instagram influencers, brands can estimate their promotions’ reach beforehand. This is based on factors like the creators’ audience size and engagement rate.

Consider that 43% of people already follow influencers on Instagram. There’s no denying the correlation between social sales and brand awareness. That’s why featuring creators as part of your funnel supports your sales efforts.

Show off your products in action

If you want to bring your products to life, influencers can make it happen.

This is where the “create” aspect of “content creator” comes into play. For example, skilled influencers understand:

  • Relevant scenarios and applications of your product(s)
  • The real-world struggles, challenges and pain points of your audience
  • How to highlight your brand’s value proposition

Look no further than the beauty industry that’s brimming with talented influencers. From skincare hacks to makeup challenges and beyond, beauty influencers know how to flex their creativity.

Tapping into an influencer’s skillset, you can uncover totally new ways to sell your products.

Humanize your brand

Done right, Instagram influencer marketing can quite literally give your brand a face.

The importance of delivering authenticity can’t be overstated when competition is so fierce on social media. Breaking through the noise means having real people promote your brand and tell your story.

That’s because creators highlight the human element of your business. Again, influencers that reflect your audience know the struggles your customers are facing.

This highlights the popularity of brand ambassador programs right now. After all, who better to speak on your brand’s behalf than someone that legitimately loves your products?

Earn valuable influencer-generated content

Note how user-generated content can be repurposed throughout your marketing funnel. Well, the same applies to influencer-generated content. This includes:

  • Featuring influencer content and reviews on product pages
  • Promoting influencers throughout your content marketing strategy (think: social media, email)
  • Use your influencer content as the basis for an ad campaign

According to Instagram, ads featuring influencers result in higher conversions and brand awareness.

Translation? The value of influencer content goes far beyond a creator’s initial post.

How much does Instagram influencer marketing cost?

The amount you need to budget for Instagram influencer marketing depends on the type of influencers you plan to work with. As you can imagine, nano-influencers and micro-influencers charge less than macro-influencers. The more followers an influencer has, the more they are typically able to charge.

Common rates we see are as follows:

  • Nano-influencers: $10-100 per post
  • Micro-influencers: $100-5,000 per post
  • Macro-influencers: $5,000-10,000 per post

Celebrity influencers can even be seen charging hundreds of thousands or even millions of dollars per post. Cristiano Ronaldo, the most followed Instagram user, charges over $3M per sponsored post.

Your required budget will depend on (a) how many influencers you want to work with and (b) what level of influencer you want to partner with. And with 73% of social marketers stating that their influencer marketing budget is shared with their overall social budget, it’s important to make sure that every dollar counts.

How to build an Instagram influencer marketing strategy

Does influencer marketing still work?”

The answer is a resounding “yes!”

But it’s not as simple as getting products into influencers’ hands and expecting results.

There’s a lot of legwork that goes into putting together an influencer marketing campaign. Below are the big-picture basics of what goes into working with influencers on Instagram.

1. Figure out your campaign goals

As it goes with any social media campaign, you need to start by pinpointing your goals. What are you hoping to achieve through your influencer marketing strategy?

Common influencer marketing goals include:

  • Increasing brand awareness
  • Generating sales
  • Improving your brand’s reputation
  • Diving into a new market
  • Increase social media follower count
  • Retaining existing customers
  • Build a library of user-generated content
  • Create social proof
  • Engage your online community

Your influencer marketing campaign can be built to achieve multiple goals. But in order to know who you want to work with, how long you want your campaign to run and what types of content you want your influencers to create, you need to pinpoint your goals.

For example, whether to choose between influencers already in your market vs. influencers in a niche you want to break into, or micro-influencers for higher engagement vs. macro-influencers for a wider reach.

2. Promote products that make sense for Instagram

Reality check: not every product is perfect for Instagram influencer marketing.

The products that tend to pop off are visually striking. There’s a reason why beauty, fashion and fitness brands are crushing it on Instagram. These industries have flashy products that lend themselves to tutorials and showcases.

Recent data also notes that the effectiveness of influencer campaigns is largely tied to demographics. In fact, 75% of users aged 18-24 and 67% of users aged 25-44 follow at least one influencer.. Keep all of the above in mind before going all-in on influencers.

3. Empower your influencers to maximize engagement

Just because someone is an “influencer” doesn’t mean engagement is guaranteed.

It’s really easy to ignore spammy and low-effort influencer posts. The 2022 Sprout Social Index™ says people will overwhelmingly unfollow influencers if they’re too promotional.

This speaks to the importance of vetting creators. Likewise, brands have to provide briefs and instructions that empower them.

It’s a balancing act as you also don’t want to sacrifice your influencers’ creative freedom. Providing a product that your influencers’ audience is actually interested in is perhaps the best thing you can do.

How to measure the ROI of Instagram influencer marketing

Your ROI, or return on investment, is going to differ greatly depending on the goals you set for yourself when you started your campaign. Popular metrics to track include:

  • Views
  • Comments
  • Shares
  • Clicks
  • Sales/conversions
  • Revenue
  • Promo codes used
  • Followers
  • Reach

If you’re looking to generate sales, then conversions, revenue or promo codes used might be your best bet. If you want to improve brand awareness, views, shares and reach will be your go-to metrics.

While it’s always difficult to pin views and reach against overall costs, try to find out how much a new follower or a single engagement tends to be worth to your brand. Do this by looking at your typical engagement rate vs. average social media budget, then put those numbers next to the increase in engagement and the amount you spent on influencer marketing.

How to work with Instagram influencers

You know how to get started on your Instagram influencer marketing strategy. Let’s talk more about how to work with those influencers.

1. Find the right Instagram influencers

As the definition of influencer evolves to include smaller creators, there’s more talent out there than ever before.

This is both a blessing and a curse for brands. There’s a non-zero chance there are relevant influencers that’d be perfect to promote your product. The search can be daunting, though.

So, how do you find the right influencers? A few options include:

  • Manual outreach through DMs and email. Ideally, you can find influencers that already know you and your product. Ask for their influencer media kit and read through it to make sure they’re a good match.
  • Invest in an influencer database or matchmaking service. These third-party tools match your brands with influencers. Most of these platforms are reserved for brands that work with creators on a large scale.
  • Hire a marketing agency. No huge surprises here. There are plenty of agencies that specialize in either reaching out to influencers or tapping into their own network of creators.
  • Use an influencer marketing platform. Tools like Tagger can help with every step of your influencer marketing campaign, from building out a strategy to finding the right influencers. Recently acquired by Sprout, we can help you get started with influencer marketing the right way.

2. Plan a campaign with Instagram influencers

Start working with your influencers to plan out your campaign! This is the fun part—you get to talk creative assets and figure out how you want the posts to go. Or, if you’re busy and prefer not to handle this step, you can always outsource to a full-service influencer marketing agency.

Your plan needs to include information like:

  • Specific products to promote (you should have planned these out in advance so you can provide your influencers with free samples)
  • Timeline for promotion
  • The number of posts (and types of posts—on Instagram, they could go with stories, posts or reels)
  • Overall voice and messaging

You can choose to let your influencer partners have as much or as little freedom with their content as you want; however, make sure their voice still shines through so it sounds authentic. And most importantly, make sure they include a disclaimer that each post is sponsored by your brand to abide by FTC guidelines.

3. Track your results

Like with any other type of campaign, your social media metrics and KPIs matter.

As we mentioned, influencer marketing is often criticized due to its lack of concrete ROI. The reality, though? There’s plenty of data to track on behalf of your influencers. Not to mention KPIs relevant to your business goals. This includes:

  • Engagement rate (ratio of followers to interactions) to gauge your influencers’ level of reach
  • Followers and audience growth
  • Conversions and link clicks (for affiliate campaigns)
  • Reach to understand how many people see your promotions
  • Traffic to see how on-site visitors from influencers behave

And that only scratches the surface!

Tracking all of the above requires coordinating with influencers and keeping a close eye on your own data.

That’s the upside of using an influencer marketing platform like Sprout Social. For example, Sprout’s platform makes it a cinch to monitor engagement metrics and keep a better pulse on campaign performance.

Screenshot of Sprout Social Instagram profile stats and performance.

Does Instagram influencer marketing make sense for your business?

The business impact of influencers on Instagram is clear. Having influencers show off your products and shout you out can build awareness fast. Much quicker than what’s possible organically, anyway.

But there’s no denying the legwork that goes into any given campaign. Brands need to weigh their options when seeking creators to work with.

Want to learn more about what working with creators is like? Make sure to check out our comprehensive guide to Instagram influencers if you haven’t already!

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]]> Authentic marketing myths and tips for getting it right https://sproutsocial.com/insights/authentic-marketing/ Tue, 14 Nov 2023 15:36:33 +0000 https://sproutsocial.com/insights/?p=179146 “Authenticity”—there’s no question that it’s one of the biggest social media buzzwords. But don’t be fooled—authentic marketing is only becoming more important. According to Read more...

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]]> “Authenticity”—there’s no question that it’s one of the biggest social media buzzwords. But don’t be fooled—authentic marketing is only becoming more important.

According to this year’s Sprout Social Index™, the number one reason consumers follow brands on social is to stay informed about products and services. But at the same time, the Index also found that authentic, non-promotional content is the number one thing consumers don’t see enough from brands.

These two things may seem at odds but they are not mutually exclusive—in fact, they go together like peanut butter and jelly. There are many ways to keep your audience up-to-date on product offerings through authentic content, and brands who get this right have much to gain.

In this article, you’ll find authentic marketing examples, tips for getting it right and what brand authenticity really means. Let’s get into it.

What is authentic marketing?

Brand authenticity on social media refers to whether brands come off as genuine, tapped into their customers on social and true to their values. It’s partly achieved by creating customer-centric, genuine content that feels relatable and aligns with the company’s voice and values. And it’s a key ingredient to building trust and loyalty with consumers, and marketing to Gen Z.

A green graphic with a question mark at the top and a headline that says, what is authentic marketing? The definition below says, Brand authenticity on social media refers to whether brands come off as genuine, tapped into their customers on social and true to their values.

Personally, I call it “foot-in-the-door” marketing. Content that’s interesting, relatable or valuable to your audience gets your foot in the door. Then you can follow up with sales messaging—but you must continually build interest and trust, too.

Consumers have grown wary of inauthentic posts and brands treating them like dollar signs. And we’ve seen a unique pushback from audiences and creators alike. Look at how audiences have embraced lo-fi content over highly-polished posts, or the rise of deinfluencing.

The rise of creators has also put new pressure on brands to feature real, trusted faces and customers on their channels. And call-out culture has rightfully made brands think twice about posting topical messages if they can’t take action.

While authenticity in marketing is associated with social content, it’s an omnichannel concept. You should apply it to all of the tactics your brand uses to engage audiences—on social, through creator partnerships, in ads and traditional broadcasts, and beyond.

3 authentic marketing misconceptions

As we mentioned, authenticity is more than just an overused buzzword. In fact, it should be added to your list of social media best practices.

Before we dive into how to bring authenticity into your content and strategy, let’s debunk three of the biggest authentic marketing misconceptions out there.

Authentic marketing can only come directly from the brand

Not all of your content has to be created by you. Featuring real people—from creators to customers—is one of the best ways to achieve more authentic digital marketing.

Nearly 40% of consumers say they like to see customer testimonials or real customer demos on social media, according to The 2022 Sprout Social Index™. Featuring real people enjoying or even creating tutorials with your products on your channels is a solid form of building trust and social proof.

Kodak, for example, features photos taken by people who use their film and products.

Reposting user-generated content (UGC) created by your customers is one of the most authentic marketing tactics you can use. It’s organic, genuine and can even serve as a visual “review” of your product.

Creating an authentic influencer marketing strategy brings trusted voices into your content, too. In fact, according to a Q3 2023 Sprout Pulse Survey, 47% of marketers say enhancing brand authenticity and trust is the most valuable opportunity with influencer marketing.

AI poses a threat to authentic marketing

Social teams are no strangers to AI—and the fears around it. But as marketers bring these tools into their workflow, the conversation around AI has shifted from “will it replace me?” to “will it make my brand sound inauthentic?”

A LinkedIn poll that asks the audience, "What is your main concern when it comes to AI? (Esp. for social teams!)" In the poll, 14% of respondents said "it's going to take my job," 71% of respondents said "Inauthentic social copy," 7% said "not sure how to use it" and 7% said "something else."

It’s a valid fear. Marketers and consumers alike have started calling out brands who respond with AI-created, impersonal messages.

But AI only poses a threat to authentic marketing if you let it. The key is using AI copy and creative tools as a starting point—not a final product. Edit AI-generated materials, like post and comment copy, to keep your content authentic, true to your brand voice and personalized.

AI tools are becoming an essential tool in marketers’ toolkits. According to the Index, 81% of marketers say AI has already had a positive impact on their work. When you use these tools right, and with discretion, they speed you up without taking away your authentic voice.

Authentic marketing means always taking a stand on issues

A few years ago, brands were expected to take a stand on tough issues—it was non-negotiable.

But there’s been a shift. According to The 2023 Sprout Social Index™, today only a quarter of consumers think brands must speak out on causes that align with their values to be memorable.

Consumers have grown skeptical of brands taking a stand, and are wary of performative activism. Over the past few years, we’ve seen many brands called out for putting out empty, inauthentic statements.

This doesn’t mean your brand should never take a stand on issues. But when you do speak out, make it count. And in your day-to-day, there are other areas to prioritize to build regular authenticity and trust—more on all of this later.

How to get authentic marketing right

We all know what authentic marketing means, and even what it looks like. But bringing it into your strategy can be challenging.

Let’s get into six key tips and authentic marketing examples to see how you can get it right in your strategy.

Go behind the scenes

Part of authentic marketing is removing the “curated” barrier between your brand and audience. Posting behind-the-scenes content (BTS) is a fun, engaging way to give audiences a peek behind the curtain.

BTS content can be lighthearted, fun and as simple as showcasing your team. Think: using lo-fi content for a “meet the team” social series, showing your workspace, or jumping on a trend and recruiting your coworkers to step in as social video talent—like this Grammarly video.

@grammarlyofficial

We’re starstruck from running into all these Barbies and Kens. 🤩 #HiBarbie #BarbieMovie #WorkHumor #OfficeHumor #OfficeLife #CorporateHumor #Grammarly

♬ Hi Barbie Hi Ken Barbie Movie Only In Theaters – Barbie Movie

But BTS content can go even deeper to build trust. For example, the Index found that consumers don’t think they see brands post enough transparency about business practices and information about how products are made.

Featuring how your products are made and sourced, who makes them, the start-to-finish process, etc. provides this level of transparency—like Nisolo does with content about their sustainability report cards.

@nisoloshoes

We all value people. We all value the planet. It’s time for our clothes to do the same. #SustainabilityFactsLabel #peopleandplanet

♬ original sound – Nisolo

Be selective about taking a stand

We already mentioned the shift in consumer skepticism and expectations around brands taking a stand. This doesn’t mean you can never take a stand on an issue.

But to stay authentic, your brand should only do so when the issue directly aligns with and reinforces your company values. And, ideally, your statement should always be backed up with action.

Sometimes that action comes in the form of a donation or direct support. Or, the brand talks the talk and walks the walk in more unique ways.

Take L.L.Bean’s social pause. Their “Off the Grid” campaign for Mental Health Awareness Month went beyond a simple post. Their social team took a month-long break from their brand’s social channels to embody their company values and get outside. On top of this, they also donated to relevant mental health-related causes.

The result? Their channels were not negatively affected, and their bold move was celebrated. L.L.Bean’s pause was backed up with action in the form of a social media break that demonstrated commitment to their values; authentic marketing at its best.

Put customers in the spotlight

People trust real people and stories—not just brands alone. Turning to your customers for content is more than just a social calendar filler; it builds trust.

Customer testimonials, repurposing reviews into campaign and ad content, reposting effective UGC—all of this brings your customer into your strategy and social feeds.

UGC can be as simple as customer-posted photos featuring your product or service. But remember: consumers are content creators, too. From “try-on hauls” to how-to tutorials and decorating, there are so many ways customers use lo-fi content and authentic posts to feature your product…and hopefully get featured on your account.

@aerie

Which new arrivals are your fave, Aerie fam? @grace weldon #AerieNewArrivals #NewArrivals #AerieOutfits #AerieTryOnHaul

♬ original sound – aerie

To find UGC more easily, encourage your audience to tag you in their content and use a branded hashtag, like Aerie’s “#AerieReal.”

Using a social media management tool makes tracking this content easier. With Sprout Social, track specific hashtags, and find all your tagged content across your social networks in one streamlined feed, saving yourself search time.

A screenshot of the Sprout Social Smart Inbox where several messages are displayed in a single feed from Instagram, Facebook and a post from X (formerly Twitter.)

Find the right partners

When building an authentic influencer marketing strategy, it pays to be choosy. You already know you shouldn’t just partner with any creator. You need to find partners with an audience that is either similar to yours, or that you want to reach.

With over half of marketers saying 26-75% of their marketing budget goes toward influencer marketing in a Q3 2023 Sprout Pulse Survey, it’s no secret that brands should ramp up their creator partnerships. But that same survey found that finding the right influencers for campaigns is a primary challenge for brands.

To offset this, over half of brands reported using dedicated influencer marketing programs. If you’re struggling to find influencers and creators, adopting a platform like Tagger to find and manage these partnerships is a great option.

But sometimes, you need to look no further than your audience to source partnerships. According to that same survey, half of marketers hire influencers who are already genuine fans of their product—a key way to ensure authentic influencer marketing partners.

One way to find influencers in your audience or industry is by using social listening. Social listening enables you to uncover conversations about your brand and products even when you’re not tagged. Using Sprout’s Social Listening solution, you can find your biggest influencers in the conversation—or even poach influencers in your competitor base.

A screenshot showing the Messages tab of Sprout's social listening solution. The tab displays messages mentioning the brand or topic. Next to the message, you can see the number of followers the message creator has, which is a great way to find new influencers.

Don’t be afraid to skip trends

Authentic digital marketing is as much about the trends you skip as the trends you jump on.

Trends can help when they’re natural. But they can hurt you when forced. Audiences can spot a brand trying to jump on a trend that doesn’t fit their brand a mile away—and will call you out for it.

Using relevant trends is a great way to ride a popularity wave and reach new audiences. But trends aren’t everything. 38% of consumers say the most memorable brands on social prioritize original content over following trending topics, according to the Index.

A green data visualization graphic from The Sprout Social Index™ that reads, 38% of consumers say the most memorable brands on social prioritize original content over following trending topics.

For example, makeup brand Glossier leaned on trends to build their TikTok account. But they’ve since shifted focus to more original content—read more about their short-form video strategy.

Before you jump on a trend, step back and ask yourself if it fits your brand and feels authentic.

Ensure you’re responsive

If you truly want to build trust and an authentic connection with your audience, be responsive. According to the Index, over half of consumers say the most memorable brands on social are those that respond.

The Index also found that 70% of consumers expect a company to provide personalized responses to customer service needs. And directly engaging with your audience and prioritizing one-to-one customer care will make you more memorable.

You can’t have authenticity in marketing if you ghost your audience. This is your sign to prioritize social media customer care every single day, and to provide extra social media customer care training to align your customer service and social efforts.

Create content that feels native to each social platform

Hear me out on this one. We’ve all seen a Reel with a TikTok logo on it—and there’s something inherently inauthentic when you can tell that a brand is simply copy/pasting content from one platform into another.

Sometimes, this is necessary and even warranted. But part of authentic marketing is creating content that feels true to the platform consumers are consuming it in.

As much as you can, create Reels and TikTok videos that feel native to those platforms by using the fonts or text-to-speech voices each platform provides.

Let’s get real: Enhance your authentic marketing strategy

New platforms will come and go. Content format preferences will ebb and flow. But the need for authentic marketing will persist through every evolution of social media.

Use the tips and tricks in this article to bring more authenticity into your marketing strategy—your audience, and leadership team, will thank you.

Part of authentic marketing is understanding what consumers want, and the latest overall trends in the social media environment. Download The 2023 Sprout Social Index™ to keep your team and strategy one step ahead.

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]]> The power of social listening for healthcare organizations https://sproutsocial.com/insights/healthcare-social-listening/ https://sproutsocial.com/insights/healthcare-social-listening/#respond Mon, 13 Nov 2023 15:15:15 +0000 https://sproutsocial.com/adapt/?p=263 Technology has revolutionized how consumers access information, with answers to everyone’s burning questions a simple search query away.

The post The power of social listening for healthcare organizations appeared first on Sprout Social.

]]> If your company receives more mentions, DMs and attention on social media than in the past, you’re not alone.

Social media has democratized access to medical information and empowered patients to take charge of their health. But it also has negative consequences. Like increasing the spread of misinformation and excluding healthcare workers from vital conversations with their patients. It has pushed some hospital systems, professional societies and pharmaceutical companies into an unflattering limelight, as patient and provider criticisms go viral. Risks like this have caused healthcare organizations to recoil, and grow cautious of being present on social channels.

The reality is that the future of the healthcare industry will be a hybrid of online and offline experiences. People will use social media networks to look up health information, find care providers, search for employment and receive updates from their healthcare team and hospital systems. They expect you to show up on social—and social data can provide value for your company, too.

A screenshot of a Northwell Health Post on X (formerly Twitter). The post reads: Sandra Lindsay RN made history as the first person in the US to receive the COVID-19 vaccine—again! Nearly 3 years after receiving the very first hashtag COVID vaccine Nurse Lindsay volunteered to be the first American to receive this season's shot, too. The posts includes an image of a woman receiving a vaccine from a healthcare provider.

By using social listening tools, you can keep an eye on trending conversations in your community, stay ahead of crises and receive real-time patient feedback that helps you improve your care. Keep reading for examples of social listening for healthcare in action.

The benefits of social listening in healthcare

The sheer volume of social content published hourly makes it tough for healthcare companies to find their patients, providers and community members. Social listening enables you to cut through the noise, hone in on relevant conversations and share valuable timely insights with your leadership team.

Here are specific ways teams can use listening to monitor and analyze audience conversations in an efficient, centralized manner, featuring advice from Sprout Social experts.

Proactive crisis management

The best things a social team can do when it comes to responding to an impending crisis are: already have a crisis plan in place and catch minor crises before they spiral out of control. According to Jill Florence, Director of Enterprise Sales at Sprout Social, “Unfortunately, PR crises are common for healthcare systems and other healthcare organizations. Many have gone through a challenging event themselves, or have seen it happen to other companies and they’re afraid of it happening to them. Whether it’s a patient who had a negative experience, a violent threat or mishandling patient data, leaders want to know about it in real-time.”

Of course, crises can be external, too. Katherine Van Allen, a Senior Solutions Engineer at Sprout, adds, “Healthcare organizations can also use listening to pay attention to government decisions, relevant current events and specific bills and or lobbying conversations that will impact care units beyond the marketing team.”

By including Sprout Social tools like Listening Spike Alerts in your crisis plan, you will be alerted to shifts in conversations around topics like your hospitals, facilities or supply chain, plus trending news. These alerts will help your team stay on top of current events, and be the first to know if a crisis is about to unfold. As Florence explains, “You don’t want to be in a situation where the CEO is the one informing you about a situation, and you’re just reacting. Getting listening alerts right away is critical to proactively managing crises, and leading the charge at your organization.”

A screen capture of a short video of a user configuring a Listening Alert in the Sprout platform. When enabling an alert, users can select metrics, alert sensitivity and key team members to notify.

Real-time patient and clinician feedback

While receiving feedback from patients and clinicians on social might seem daunting, it’s the best way to source unfiltered intel. By intercepting this feedback, the social team accesses voice of customer knowledge that can help improve multiple aspects of your organization.

With social listening insights on hand, it’s possible to understand the needs, opinions and feelings of patients, physicians and community members. And understanding them translates to better content, care, and recruitment and retention strategies. As Van Allen puts it, “The [healthcare organizations] who use social listening make more informed decisions about their content strategy.”

By making brand health a part of your listening strategy, you can consistently monitor audience sentiment on social. A platform like Sprout enables you to visualize overall sentiment trends and zero-in on key audience pain points. With this presentation-ready business intelligence, you’re empowered to share audience feedback—like how patients feel about your current wait times and the care they receive, to how physicians would describe your culture—with the rest of your organization.

A screenshot of the sentiment summary in Sprout's social listening solution. In the middle of the report is a chart that shows how much positive and negative sentiment there is for the brand. On the right side of the report are messages and their assigned sentiment type. This empowers you to explore what messages and customer feedback is impacting your brand's sentiment.

“Comparative” intelligence

In the healthcare industry, it’s common to consider other healthcare systems and companies “comparators” rather than competitors. While you might not consider other organizations your direct competition, you can still use them as a barometer to measure your performance—from patient care and satisfaction to talent recruitment and culture.

Van Allen describes, “Use listening to understand your share of voice and how people are talking about comparators. Ask yourself: What kinds of specialties, hiring conversations and patient feedback are they getting? How does that compare to us?”

This is especially helpful amid an industry-wide staffing shortage and quickly evolving patient expectations. “The hiring landscape is so competitive that customers need to understand why other companies are being chosen over them,” says Florence. Social listening delivers key learnings that can help you reach (and exceed) care benchmarks on social and beyond, and rethink how your company approaches hiring and workplace culture overall.

Sprout’s Competitive Analysis report aggregates social data from your comparators, including impressions, engagements, sentiment and overall share of voice. You can dig deeper into specific audience feedback in the Conversation and Messages tabs.

A screenshot of Sprout Social's Competitive Analysis dashboard that demonstrates how three competitors compare in share of voice, impressions, engagements and sentiment.

5 examples of social listening for healthcare in action

We researched examples of ways real healthcare companies use social listening to increase patient satisfaction and engagement, while balancing growing needs around hiring and patient care standards. Here’s what we found:

A list of 5 ways to use social listening as a healthcare organization. The reasons listed include: guide expansion, provide audiences with relevant content, route audiences intel to the right department, track awareness campaigns and increase share of voice.

1. Guide expansion

As hospital systems and other healthcare organizations expand, real-time audience feedback gleaned from social listening empowers marketing teams to provide a strategic vision.

Florence cites a specific example of a hospital system she worked with that used customer feedback from social listening to guide expansion. “They were completely maxed out. They didn’t have large enough facilities or enough clinicians to accommodate their community, and they felt the backlash on social. Customers complained about long wait times, poor physician care and overall bad experiences. As their company increased capacity, the social team was on the front lines. They managed customer pain points and kept decision makers abreast, while using that feedback to influence expansion in a way that maintained positive brand reputation long-term.”

2. Provide audiences with relevant content

Social listening insights give you a window into issues that matter to your patients, community members and physicians, and enable you to craft an audience-centric content strategy.

A screenshot of a Post on X from the Cleveland Clinic. The Post reads: Five health benefits of pickleball, and links to a relevant article. Attached to the Post is an image of four people playing the trending game on a pickleball court.

Van Allen describes how organizations can use listening to adapt their messaging to meet the needs of their audience. “We see healthcare organizations use social listening to research trending conversations and industry topics, and use that intel to inform their content strategy. For example, a hospital system could create a Listening topic about going “back to school” and surface that parents within their community want more tips to prepare for cold, flu and RSV season.”

3. Route audience intel to the right department

At some healthcare organizations, multiple social marketing teams work together—each representing a different department (e.g., cardiology, dermatology, oncology, etc.). Using a robust and intuitive platform like Sprout makes it possible for these teams to share social listening insights with one another, and facilitate stronger communication and cross-team collaboration.

Florence adds, “Using Sprout’s custom Listening reports lets healthcare marketers generate and share insights with other functions.” By creating department-specific Listening topics, social marketers at healthcare organizations—like hospital systems—can find the specific insights they need to reach their unique goals, like increasing cardiology patient satisfaction. Sprout’s centralized platform houses all of this data in one place, making it possible for marketing teams to work in harmony.

A screenshot of Sprout Social's Query Builder in the Listening tool. From the Query Builder, you can provide a query title, description and sources, and see a preview of the results.

4. Track awareness campaigns

Healthcare organizations can use social listening to gauge how effective promotional campaigns for emerging research and timely initiatives are.

For example, a medical society specializing in cardiology ran a major awareness campaign centered around American Heart Month. To measure the performance and impact of their work, they created a listening query around their organization name and the branded campaign hashtag. By analyzing this Listening data, they were able to identify key strengths and weaknesses of the campaign, resulting in valuable strategy refinements for upcoming initiatives.

A screenshot of the Listening engagement report in the Sprout platform. In the report, you can see topic engagements broken down by comments, shares and likes, plus average engagements per day. You can also see engagements visualized over time on a line graph.

You can also use listening data to find advocates who were vocal during a past campaign, and tap them for future partnerships.

5. Increase share of voice

Listening is a valuable tool for healthcare organizations who want to improve their credibility and rise up to the level of other comparators.

In one instance, a children’s hospital looking to raise its national ranking through strategic media opportunities created a competitive listening topic to track its share of voice against higher-ranking hospitals. While analyzing the Listening data, they identified opportunities for submission-based awards and event sponsorships that might help bolster their reputation. They also established new competitive benchmarks for engagements and impressions.

In healthcare, you hope that people never need certain services (especially emergency/urgent care). But you do want to be top of mind, in the moment, when they do.

Social listening shows your audience you care

Your audience expects healthcare brands like yours to be present on social media. Despite its reputational and compliance risks, social offers a wide variety of insights that enable you to manage crises effectively, gather real-time patient and provider feedback, and stay on par with your comparators.

Finding value in social as a healthcare organization requires tools that capture actionable insights and mine value from social to drive exceptional patient and provider experiences.

Want to start turning social data into elevated patient care? Request a demo of Sprout Social’s Listening solution today.

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]]> https://sproutsocial.com/insights/healthcare-social-listening/feed/ 0 Strategic brand collaborations: Finding successful partnerships https://sproutsocial.com/insights/brand-collaborations/ Mon, 13 Nov 2023 06:00:16 +0000 https://sproutsocial.com/insights/?p=159377/ There isn’t much that gets consumers more excited than seeing a collaboration between their two favorite brands. Marketers are learning more about their target Read more...

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]]> There isn’t much that gets consumers more excited than seeing a collaboration between their two favorite brands. Marketers are learning more about their target audiences and some of the most valuable information is what other brands they have their eyes on. Brand collaborations, especially co-marketing, are a win-win for your brand reputation.

In this article, we’ll explore how brand collaboration works and strategies to find the best partnership for your business. And we’ll explore some of the best brand collaborations we’ve seen this year to help inspire your next campaign.

What is a brand collaboration?

A brand collaboration is a mutually beneficial partnership between two or more businesses that work together to create an experience, product or service to achieve a common goal. This alliance leverages the strengths and customer segments of each brand to boost sales, increase brand awareness and expand reach to new audiences.

How do brand collaborations work?

Think of a brand collaboration as a group project. Each business works together to combine its resources, audience reach and creativity to co-create products, campaigns or activations. Brand collaborations are facilitated by influencer marketing or working directly with other businesses through co-marketing or co-branding efforts.

How do brands collaborate with influencers?

Influencer marketing campaigns are common brand collaborations. They rely on a creator’s influence and personal brand to sell products or offerings. These influencers resonate with a brand’s target audience or have credibility with a new segment they’re trying to reach.

How do you collaborate with other brands?

You can work with other businesses through product collaboration—also known as co-branding—which involves two brands creating a new product or service. For example, e.l.f. and Dunkin’ dropped a donut-inspired makeup line last year.

Co-marketing is another option for partnership. It’s a strategy that leverages each company’s reputation and customer base to introduce its brand to a new audience, driving additional revenue and awareness. Co-marketing is effective for brands that aren’t direct competitors but have overlap either by audience or industry. For example, GoPro and Red Bull have an ongoing partnership and cross-promote each other’s events. GoPro is adored by athletes, mountain bikers and other adventurers so working with an energy drink brand is the right fit.

Strategies to find collaboration partners

Deciding how to partner with brands can seem tricky. If you’re thinking about creating some collaboration magic, you’ll want to keep a few things in mind. Here are a few strategies to help you find the right partners for your brand collaborations.

Identify your goals for collaboration

Whether you want to increase sales or reach, you need to start by identifying your goals. From there, your brand can connect with complementary partners within your industry or target audience. If you’re leaning towards an influencer marketing campaign, consider using the Five Ws + H framework to help you measure return on investment and plan effectively across the customer journey.

Search for complementary brands familiar with your audience

Try to focus on what you might have in common with potential partners. Identify what your audiences associate with your brands and don’t be afraid to go bolder than you might on a solo campaign. Maybe your perfect partnership revolves around the types of feelings your product evokes, shared interests your audiences have or the priorities of your target market. For example, Dunkin’ and e.l.f. had common market segments they tackled together. Keeping something in common will keep your brand collaboration on track later on.

Test early

Social is a great barometer for your audience’s interest in potential co-branded activations or products. Through social listening, you can figure out which parts of a collaboration to lean into—and which you should cut. Consider teasing a collaboration with an interested brand and see how your audience responds.

Benefits of brand collaborations

Let’s walk through several benefits of brand collaborations:

1. Reach new audiences

If your business is looking to appeal to a new target demographic, such as younger consumers like Millennials or Gen Z,  partnering with another company that has an established customer base enables your brand to get in front of audiences that you haven’t been able to reach before.

2. Generate buzz and improve revenue

Everyone loves a limited edition product or collection from their favorite brands. Creating a new product/service that’s marketed as an exclusive or limited-time offering can ignite interest across your business, generate demand and increase sales.

3. Marketing resource-sharing

Marketing efforts can be expensive at scale, but brand collaborations are more cost-effective since resources are shared between both partners. Not only can the partnership save costs, but you also have access to more talent across teams.

4. Leverage another brand’s strengths

The beauty of a mutually beneficial partnership is that each brand has something unique to bring to the table. Capitalizing on each other’s strengths helps all parties achieve their goals. For example, one brand might have an excellent product team, but a small creative team, so collaborating with a company that is known for its originality and innovation could be a perfect match.

Best brand collaborations we’ve seen this year

It might sound cliche, but teamwork really does make the dream work! Here’s a brief overview of some of our favorite brand collaborations over the past year.

Google Pixel x Druski

Google Pixel, the official fan phone of the NBA and WNBA, launched a season-long campaign during the NBA opening games. The mutli-channel campaign titled “Built Different” features content creator and comedian Druski. The campaign features Druski in a series of vignettes with cameos from athletes and sportscasters like Jimmy Butler, Flau’jae Johnson, Giannis Antetokounmpo, Ernie Johnson Jr. and Taylor Rooks.

Druski is known for his social media skits, Instagram Live sessions and parody music label, Coulda Been Records. Like the campaign, his content is often star-studded with some of the biggest names in the entertainment and sports industry. His relatable content touches on everything from music to college sports—and you’ll probably see Drake or Jack Harlow if you ever tune into one of his livestreams. He also recently launched his sports agency, 4Lifers.

A Google Pixel x NBA: Project Built Different campaign video on YouTube featuring Druski, athletes and sportscasters.

Why the partnership works: Druski’s audience and his connection to the sports and entertainment industry make the partnership with the NBA feel authentic and fresh, making for laughs between professional athletes and fans alike.

Liquid Death and MeUndies

Liquid Death and MeUndies are on a mission to brainwash doctors. The brands collaborated to create an underwear collection with Liquid Death imagery. Both brands are known for their humorous brand voice and whimsical social media posts so it’s a match made in marketing heaven.

An Instagram Reel from Liquid Death and MeUndies featuring their underwear collaboration. The comments show users enjoy the video's quirky, humorous tone.

Both brands co-marketed the underwear collection on their social channels. Although customers can’t purchase from the Liquid Death site, they can purchase on MeUndies, as you can see in the image below that shows a redirection message:

A message on Liquid Death's website notifying users they are being redirected to the MeUndies website to complete their purchase.

Why the partnership works: Refreshing beverages and underwear may seem like an unlikely duo, but Liquid Death and MeUndies’ partnership illustrates the power of seamless co-branding and co-marketing. The collection evokes MeUndies’s mission to inspire authentic self-expression through comfortable, creative designs through Liquid Death’s punk rock imagery.

Telfar and UGG

Telfar and UGG started their partnership in 2021. The collection combined each brand’s most iconic designs: Telfar’s Shopping Bag and UGGs sheepskin-lined boots. Two years later, the collaboration is still running strong and remains one of Telfar’s most highly anticipated drops. In 2023, they expanded the collection to include several new materials. In September, they launched Telfar x UGGs denim collection, later dropping crinkle patent leather as the next material addition to the collection.

An Instagram carousel post featuring a denim and sheepskin bag and other designs for the 2023 Telfar x UGG collection.

The fashion brands didn’t stop there either. Their campaign features several celebrities and social media figures including Lil Kim, Morris Chestnut, Rolling Ray, Tezzo Touchdown, and Yung Miami.

Why the partnership works: Designer Telfar Clemens won the Best Fashion Campaign of the Year at Essence’s 2023 Best in Black Fashion Awards. Telfar’s slogan is “Not for you, for everyone,” a testament to the brand’s value of championing inclusivity, affordable luxury and revolutionary pricing models. Like Telfar, UGG is known for its cult fashion following and revered as a must-have fashion staples for everyone’s wardrobe. Merging some of the most sought-after pieces in the fashion space with influencers and stand-out photography shapes an experience that resonates with audiences.

Jeni’s and Lonely Ghost

On Jeni’s landing page for the collaboration, the ice cream brand expresses how adults forget the magic of ice cream and how it’s always better with friends. They explain they partnered with Lonely Ghost because they are like-minded brands centered on community and positivity.

The brands worked together to create Jeni’s first cookie dough flavor and a limited edition merch line featuring T-shirts, a sweatshirt and hat with positive affirmations to highlight the collaboration’s tagline, “Melt in the Moment.” Lonely Ghost held a pop-up at a local scoop shop in Chicago to sell the new merch and ice cream.

Each brand promoted the collection on social media as well:

An Instagram post from Jeni's Ice Creams and Lonely Ghost featuring their clothing collaboration. In the caption, they share information about the collaboration including the launch date.

An Instagram post from Jeni's Ice Creams featuring their ice cream collaboration with Lonely Ghost. In the caption, they share information about the ice cream flavor and the launch date for the brand collaboration.

Why the partnership works: Jeni’s and Lonely Ghost are both anchored by community and living a positive, experiential lifestyle. Through creating a limited-edition flavor and apparel collection, they successfully created anticipation for a customer-centric experience. After all, what’s better than snuggling up in a sweatshirt while devouring a pint of ice cream?

Begin planning your next partnership

As you can see, collaborations are a testament of the magic that can happen when two or more brands join together to shape something special for their customers. Use our product launch checklist to jump start your next brand collaboration.

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]]> How to integrate TikTok Shop into your social strategy https://sproutsocial.com/insights/tiktok-shop/ Thu, 09 Nov 2023 15:00:17 +0000 https://sproutsocial.com/insights/?p=178782 TikTok Shop presents a massive opportunity for brands, combining TikTok’s powerful discovery engine (#TikTokMadeMeBuyIt) with in-app e-commerce capabilities to create a new shopping experience Read more...

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]]> TikTok Shop presents a massive opportunity for brands, combining TikTok’s powerful discovery engine (#TikTokMadeMeBuyIt) with in-app e-commerce capabilities to create a new shopping experience (#IBoughtItonTikTok). Still, these new TikTok shopping features come with a learning curve.

For example, you might be wondering how to integrate it into your social strategy in a way that fits the platform and doesn’t overcomplicate your current approach. Or maybe you’re already managing other social media storefronts and you want to know how to add TikTok Shop to the mix.

This article provides an in-depth overview of TikTok Shop and how to make the most of it for your brand by covering the following topics:

Table of contents:

What is TikTok Shop?

TikTok Shop is a suite of e-commerce features that allow brands, merchants, and creators to sell products directly within the TikTok app.

A screenshot of TikTok videos featured under the #TikTokMadeMeBuyIt hashtag

From drink tumblers to hair dryers to pickle sweatshirts, you’ve probably heard of at least a few products that became massively popular after going viral on TikTok. This phenomenon even spawned the hashtag #TikTokMadeMeBuyIt with over 73.3 billion views and a seemingly endless array of promotional videos from brands, influencers and everyday consumers.

With the launch of TikTok Shop, the app is evolving from a product discovery app to an all-in-one marketing and sales platform. Once a product catches a user’s eye, they can buy it in just a few clicks without leaving the app.

TikTok Shop is currently available in Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam, the Philippines, Singapore, the United Kingdom and the United States. The TikTok Shop experience and eligibility requirements also differ for creators, partners, shoppers and sellers.

Keep reading to learn how to use these features as a brand, user or influencer.

TikTok Shop for Creators 

TikTok Shop allows creators to showcase and promote products they love to their community and launch new revenue streams. For example, through TikTok Shop’s Affiliate Program (more on this later), creators can earn a commission from products they promote in videos and livestreams.

TikTok Shop Creator eligibility requirements vary. In the U.K., creators must be located in the country, over 18, have a minimum of 1,000 followers and have posted a video on TikTok in the last 28 days. If you’re in the US, you can start selling via shoppable and livestreams even if you have a new account and zero followers. More information is in the FAQs.

TikTok Shop for Partners 

TikTok Shop Partners provide e-commerce or marketing support to TikTok sellers or creators. For example, TikTok Shop partners might provide services like short-form video production, account onboarding support, content strategy, short video ideation, live shopping moderation and business analysis. To register as a TikTokShop partner, users must create an account, select their category and market, and submit an application.

TikTok Shop for Shoppers 

If you’re a TikTok user based in a country with TikTok Shop, you should have access to the in-app shopping features—no additional registration is required.

TikTok Shop for Sellers 

Brands that want to sell their products using TikTok Shop must complete a four-step application process.

  1. Sign up. Sign up for TikTok Shop using a U.S. phone number and email address.
  2. Complete an application. Verify your identity with a certificate of incorporation, a U.S. passport or a U.S. driver’s license. You also need to provide payment and tax information.
  3. Check your email for confirmation of your approval. The application review time varies but is typically three to five days.
  4. Link your TikTok account to your Shop. Once approved, you’re ready to set up your Shop.

How to set up TikTok Shop

According to TikTok’s Seller University, setting up a TikTok Shop involves the following key steps—shop setup, executing sales and fulfillment.

Shop setup 

You’ll need to provide more company information and documents during this phase. Here are the following key tasks

  • Upload shop documents and legal information
  • Add warehouse and return address
  • Link bank account
  • Select your shipping option (shipped by seller or by platform)
  • Configure shipping template

You may also need to provide product certification and brand authorization at this stage.

Selling and fulfillment 

To list products on your profile, either add them individually, batch upload multiple products or integrate TikTok Shop with your existing e-commerce platform. To fulfill orders, use TikTok’s fulfillment services or handle it yourself. If you go the latter route, you must book a courier and pack and prepare your products for shipping.

Other factors brands need to consider 

Everything you need to set up and manage your TikTok Shop is in the TikTok Shop Seller Center, which you get access to once you’re account is approved. The Seller Center even has a Growth Center where sellers learn to manage their TikTok Shop by completing ‘missions’ and collecting rewards like ad vouchers and commission deductions.

Still, managing a social commerce platform takes a lot of time and effort. There are a lot of different responsibilities involved, such as

  • Inventory management
  • Order tracking and fulfillment
  • Managing returns and refunds
  • Customer service
  • Promotions and ads
  • Influencer and affiliate management
  • Financial reporting
  • Data analysis

TikTok Shop is essentially a digital store, so consider the following questions before you dive in:

  • How will you balance managing your TikTok shop with any other ecommerce sites you have?
  • What resources will you need to cover the various aspects of the retail experience?
  • How will you adapt your ecommerce strategy to fit TikTok’s audience and align with their expectations on the platform?

7 ways to sell with TikTok Shop

TikTok Shop adds even more ways to make money on TikTok. From Home Shopping Network (HSN)-style livestreams to shoppable ads, here are all the different ways to sell with TikTok Shop.

Three phone screenshots showing the LIVE Shopping, Shoppable Video, and Store features of TikTok Shop

In-Feed video 

Include shoppable product tags in your posts so your audience can purchase right from the video.

LIVE shopping 

Like HSN for a new generation, LIVE Shopping allows brands and creators to include shoppable product tags in LIVE videos. Promote, sell and engage with your audience, all in real time.

Product showcase 

Display your entire product line-up or curate custom collections within your in-app Shop. This feature lets your audience browse product tiles, read reviews and purchase directly from a brand’s profile

Shop tab 

This feature enables businesses to display products in a marketplace where customers search and discover promotions. Customers can also view product recommendations and manage orders in the Shop tab.

Affiliate Program 

An alternative to brand partnerships, TikTok creators earn commissions on products they promote in videos and livestreams through the Affiliate Program.

Shop ads 

Promote your TikTok Shops to potential buyers with paid ads. Boost your reach and increase conversions since customers discover and complete purchases in one platform.

Fulfilled by TikTok 

Similar to Amazon, TikTok has fulfillment centers that pick, pack and ship products to customers for sellers.

8 tips for integrating TikTok Shop into your social strategy

Incorporating TikTok Shop into your social media strategy can be exciting but daunting. Most users think of TikTok as an entertainment app, so how do you drive them to your Shop without being too sales-y? From leaning on creators and affiliates to turning viral organic content into ad campaigns, here are some tips to help you make the most of TikTok’s new selling features without exhausting your audience.

Ensure your brand and products fit the platform 

Consumers are still getting used to shopping on TikTok, so purchases are usually lower-cost, low-risk “impulse buys”. TikTok is also a video-first entertainment content platform with a large Gen Z demographic. If you feel you can reach your target demographic on TikTok, and have products that translate well to video and hit the right price point, TikTok Shop could be a great fit for you. But ultimately, you should adopt a test-and-learn approach before diving in headfirst.

Optimize your bio 

TikTok doesn’t give you a lot of characters, so make them count. Clearly describe your brand, include keywords for searchability, use emojis to add personality and end with a strong call-to-action to drive sales.

A screenshot of Fenty Beauty’s TikTok page featuring their profile description. The description reads: “Fenty Beauty by RIHANNA #CrueltyFree Shop the looks!”

Make purchasing instructions crystal clear  

Help your audience get familiar with TikTok Shop. Mention where they can buy, include clear links and explain how people can shop from your store.

Use live sessions to launch new products 

Build hype around new arrivals or collections by hosting a LIVE Shopping event. Show off your latest products and answer questions—all in real time.

An image featuring three screenshots from different TikTok Live Shopping events. The text says Go shopping with Addison Rae, Chase Stokes and Madison Bailey.

Promote your catalog (but not in every video) 

Your audience may get fatigued if all of your content feels like advertising. Keep viewers engaged by posting a mix of promotional and entertaining videos or adding humor to sales-focused content.

Leverage creators and affiliates 

TikTok is a video-first platform, so you’ll need to invest heavily in video creative to establish a presence on the app. Partnering with popular creators and affiliates will lighten your creative load and get your brand in front of a wider audience.

@loveandpebble

“Seriously the only mask I use and trust” -@accutanewithannabelle ❤️🙏🏼 #accutanejourney #skincare #skincaretips #skincareproducts

♬ YONCÉ x BIG POPPA BABY Q – Baby Q💖

Connect your organic and paid strategy 

Brands like Love and Pebble and MySmile have boosted sales by re-using high-performing organic content as creative for paid ad campaigns. Just make sure you get permission from the original creator first if you didn’t create it.

Tap into your existing community 

Use retargeting ad campaigns to bring website visitors to your TikTok Shop. Or use LIVE Shopping to engage your existing TikTok community. For example, skincare brand Glow Hub hosts weekly LIVE Shopping events to showcase products, educate followers and show them how to build a skincare routine.

Upgrade your social strategy with TikTok Shop

TikTok is already a valuable marketing channel. With the launch of TikTok Shop and other platforms like YouTube adding similar shopping features, it’s clear that we’re entering a new social media era—shifting from an awareness play to a full-funnel strategy.

Integrating sales and e-commerce goals into your social media strategy requires research, strategy and cross-functional collaboration. To jump-start the process, we created a tool to guide those initial conversations, define priorities and get everyone on the same page.

Download the Social Commerce Strategy Interview Guide to start building your social commerce strategy.

The post How to integrate TikTok Shop into your social strategy appeared first on Sprout Social.

]]> The complete guide to TikTok influencer marketing https://sproutsocial.com/insights/tiktok-influencer-marketing/ Thu, 09 Nov 2023 15:00:03 +0000 https://sproutsocial.com/insights/?p=178418 There are over 100,000 TikTok influencers in the United States across a number of different niches. This means that no matter what your business Read more...

The post The complete guide to TikTok influencer marketing appeared first on Sprout Social.

]]> There are over 100,000 TikTok influencers in the United States across a number of different niches. This means that no matter what your business is promoting, there’s likely a slew of influencers available to work with and get your brand name out there.

And why would you want to work with TikTok influencers? Influencer marketing is a powerful marketing strategy that helps you increase brand awareness, build trust in your audience and generate more sales.

Throughout this article, we’re going to discuss how the TikTok platform can be incorporated into your influencer marketing strategy. Let’s dig in.

Table of contents:

Looking to accelerate revenue and grow your brand faster with TikTok influencer marketing? Tagger and Sprout Social together creates true value for you through the alignment and unification of AI-powered influencer marketing and social media management. 

What is TikTok influencer marketing?

TikTok influencer marketing is the act of working with influencers to promote your products and/or services on TikTok. Working with TikTok influencers can help you build your brand and reach an even wider audience.

With TikTok influencer marketing, your influencer partners are the ones creating and sharing the content. This differs widely from traditional TikTok marketing strategies as those revolve around your brand and social media team creating and sharing its own content on your brand account.

While many brands do share the influencer videos on their own accounts as well, the goal of influencer marketing on TikTok is to spread the word about your brand by introducing it to your influencer partners’ audiences.

Why use TikTok influencer marketing?

Why should you incorporate influencer marketing into your TikTok strategy? Working with influencers can get expensive and it takes a lot of time to coordinate. But the influencer marketing ROI can be worth it. Here are three reasons to consider TikTok influencer marketing.

Improve brand engagement on TikTok

Influencers tend to have a much more engaged audience than brands do. It’s the nature of the beast when someone feels like they’re interacting with a person instead of a logo.

However, if an influencer is talking about your product, their followers are likely to start talking about your product in the comments. This can then lead to them finding your brand on TikTok and interacting with your brand’s content—and of course, hopefully making a purchase. Which leads us to our next point.

Increase sales

Influencer marketing can also increase sales. Influencer marketing is a form of social proof, showing potential customers that other people use and enjoy your product. This increases the likelihood that people will be interested in your product, due to a sort of mob mentality.

Plus, TikTok and TikTok Shop make it easy for influencers to lead customers to purchase your products. And with #TikTokMadeMeBuyIt being such a popular meme, TikTok users expect to be influenced. Their wallets are already partially open every time they scroll. And seeing your product on one of their favorite influencers’ feeds can be just the push they need to buy it.

Boost your brand’s authenticity on TikTok

Brand authenticity refers to how genuine or authentic customers believe your brand is. And the influencers you partner with and the content they create surrounding your product or service can help boost your brand’s own authenticity.

Brand authenticity helps potential customers feel closer to a brand, fueling loyalty and retention. Keep this in mind when choosing your influencer partners so that you work with people whose messaging aligns with your brand mission.

How to find the right TikTok influencers for your brand

We just mentioned how important it is to find the right influencers for brand authenticity—but it matters for more than that, too. You need to work with influencers whose audience matches yours and who make sense to promote your brand.

Here are a few ways to help you discover the right TikTok influencers for your brand.

Determine your niche

What niche or industry is your business in? Determining your niche will be a major factor in finding the right influencers. But on TikTok, it comes down to more than that—you also need to determine your subculture.

Subcultures are a major TikTok trend and help users find content they’re interested in. Subcultures tend to have their own hashtag and niche content, like #BookTok (for book lovers), #FoodTok (for recipe creators), #FitTok (for fitness enthusiasts) or #MomsofTikTok (for parents).

If your business fits into one of those, peruse those hashtags and look for influencers within those subcultures. They could be the perfect people to consider working with.

Search for specific topics using keywords

For Gen Z, TikTok doubles as a search engine. In fact, 51% of Gen Z women head to TikTok over Google to make a search. TikTok’s search feature is that sophisticated. Easily input keywords or topics into TikTok’s search to find videos, users, sounds, TikTok Shops, live videos, places and hashtags related to those keywords.

Look at the videos and users that pop up to see if you can find any new influencers. Add them to your list to reach out to.

Review trending hashtags

TikTok hashtags can also be a great way to discover trends. Discover popular hashtags to find influencers hopping on those trends. There are a few different ways to discover new hashtags.

First, keep an eye on your For You page. This is the best place to discover new content. Take a look at the hashtags that are being used and pay attention to recurring tags. Click on them to view even more content using those hashtags.

You can also tap the Search icon in your TikTok app. Find it at the top right corner of your screen. This is where you can search for your keywords we mentioned in the last point, but it’s also where you can see some trending topics.

A screenshot showing the search interface in the TikTok app

Click on different topics under the “You may like” heading to see what types of videos are posted, the hashtags they’re using and if any influencers related to your business are talking about those topics.

Another option is to check out the TikTok Ads Creative Center. Here, you can head to Trends > Hashtags to see the top trending hashtags in your area, or globally.

A screenshot of the TikTok Ads Creative Center

Get info like the number of posts that have been made using that hashtag, the number of views the hashtag has gotten and a simple line chart showing how the hashtag is trending.

Use an influencer marketing tool

Influencer marketing tools can be extremely helpful for finding, reaching out to and partnering with influencers. Upfluence and Collabstr are two influencer marketplaces designed to help brands find the best influencers to work with. Many such marketplaces also offer additional features that enable companies to reach out to these influencers, pay them and set up campaigns all through their marketplace.

If you really want to revolutionize your influencer marketing with data-powered social intelligence, check out Tagger by Sprout Social. Tagger by Sprout Social empowers marketers to drive impactful influencer marketing strategies, enabling you to grow brand presence authentically, engage with new targeted audiences and generate revenue faster.

Check out influencers your competitors are partnering with

Look at the influencers who are working with your competitors. Do this by searching their brand name in the TikTok search feature and checking out the videos that appear in search results.

While you might not want to work with the exact same influencers—unless it’s clear the partnership is over—this can still give you a good idea of the type of influencer who would work well for your campaign.

Work with an agency

Finally, consider working with an agency. TikTok influencer marketing agencies can fully take over the entire process, finding the best influencers (because they’ve worked with them before), drawing up a contract that works for both parties, handling asset creative and campaign details and putting together the final report with campaign results.

Examples of brands using TikTok influencer marketing

Now that you know how to find the right influencers, let’s go over a few real-life TikTok influencer marketing examples. These can show you the type of end video you should expect from working with your influencers.

1. Aerie

Aerie is a clothing brand focusing on undergarments, loungewear and activewear. But their biggest focus is on inclusivity, ensuring people of all shapes and sizes have access to comfortable and well-fitting clothes.

Even clothes that are possible to put on one-handed, as we see in this influencer video below. Influencer Gemma Adby created a video showcasing how easy it is to put on this Aerie-designed bra with just one hand.

TikTok influencer promotes for Liberare

This particular video was actually created specifically for Aerie’s TikTok page. And while that’s one way to manage your influencer marketing, you may also want your influencers to share the content on their page to reach their own audiences.

2. Supergoop

Supergoop is an SPF/sunscreen-based skincare brand. This video below shows an influencer using one of their products while she gets ready.

TikTok influencer promotes supergoop

And yes, while this does also live on the Supergoop website (why not turn your influencer content into user-generated content?), it originated on the influencer’s profile.

3. BEHR

Here’s a more traditional example of an influencer post from paint company BEHR. TikTok influencer Laura Whaley creates skits detailing the different people and personalities that work in a corporate office setting. Because that’s the kind of content that her audience expects from her, it makes sense to work an influencer post in with the same type of skit.

Here, we have a conversation between two of the characters in Laura’s skits where one character tells another the details about a BEHR sweepstakes, causing the other character to envision herself painting her house—using BEHR paint, of course.

Screenshot from TikTok of influencer promoting Behr paint.

This video fits seamlessly in with Laura’s regularly scheduled content, making it a great example of influencer content.

4. Lulus

Lulus is an online clothing company that worked with TikTok influencer Madison Humphrey to create a humorous video about going out. Lulus typically sells dresses and other more formal wear for events or nights out, so this piece of content fits perfectly.

Screenshot of TikTok influencer promoting Lulus.

Plus, they’ve also turned this video into an ad to reach an even wider audience on the platform.

5. Pair Eyewear

Pair Eyewear is an innovative glasses company that have created a pair of magnetic glasses so customers can easily snap on different glasses designs and change up their look. If you’re on TikTok, you likely have heard of Pair Eyewear, because their influencer marketing and advertising campaigns are extensive.

Here’s an example of a humorous video from one of their influencers, Dad Chats.

Screenshot of TikTok influencer promoting Pair Eyewear.

Pair Eyewear relies on both entertaining organic content from their influencers as well as promotional videos they can turn into ads.

Get started with TikTok influencer marketing

Want to get more out of your TikTok influencer marketing? Request a demo and learn more about how you can use Tagger by Sprout Social to make your influencer marketing campaigns come to life.

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]]> How to analyze customer sentiment to improve customer experience https://sproutsocial.com/insights/customer-sentiment-analysis/ Wed, 08 Nov 2023 14:30:43 +0000 https://sproutsocial.com/insights/?p=179110 Customer expectations are at an all-time high: 60% of customers will switch to a competitor after a negative experience. 73% of customers want companies Read more...

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]]> Customer expectations are at an all-time high:

  • 60% of customers will switch to a competitor after a negative experience.
  • 73% of customers want companies to recognize their unique needs and expectations.
  • 52% of customers expect an answer within an hour of posting on a brand’s digital page.

As a business, you need to figure out how to deliver great customer experiences while keeping up with these changing demands.

Part of that equation is understanding how customers think and feel about your brand. That’s what sentiment analysis is all about.

In this post, you’ll learn what customer sentiment analysis is, why it matters and how to do it right. We’ve also included helpful tips and tools to get you started on the right foot.

Table of Contents

What is customer sentiment analysis?

Customer sentiment analysis is a facet of AI marketing that involves understanding how customers think and feel about your products, services or business.

When a customer leaves a review, comments on your posts or shares a photo with your product, they’re expressing an emotion—such as joy, frustration or disappointment.

As a brand, your job is to decipher that emotion, paint an accurate picture of the customer experience and then use that insight to improve future experiences.

Why do you need to analyze customer sentiment?

Sentiment analysis is an integral part of delivering an exceptional AI customer experience. It helps you understand the nuances of emotion that drive satisfaction, loyalty and advocacy.

Here are five ways analyzing customer sentiment can help your business:

Monitor overall customer satisfaction

Happy customers leave good reviews. Unhappy customers leave bad reviews.

Sounds easy, right? But it’s not that simple. Sometimes, you need to read between the lines.

For example, if your app’s review section is quiet after a new update, sentiment analysis might reveal users are unimpressed, not overjoyed.

By capturing the emotional undertones in customer feedback and conversations, businesses can gauge satisfaction levels with greater accuracy.

Improve customer experience

Sentiment analysis offers actionable insights that can help you craft experiences tailored to the emotional needs of your customers.

For example, you might identify that customers find your landing page confusing. Writing clearer copy and fixing the design can help you improve user experience on your website and generate more sign ups for your business.

Understanding customer sentiment also lets you create targeted campaigns around topics customers feel strongly about and respond to feedback more empathetically, which improves their overall experience with your brand.

Gain real-time consumer insights

Sentiment analysis can help you capture instant feedback during product launches and campaigns. This allows you to react promptly, preventing issues from snowballing.

For example, let’s say a video game company drops a new game and monitors social media and gaming forums for player reactions. Within hours, they detect a pattern of complaints about a difficult level, which is causing players to lose interest.

Acting on these real-time insights, the company releases a patch to adjust the difficulty settings and posts tips for navigating the challenging sections. By doing so, they prevent early negative reviews from damaging the game’s reputation.

Build brand loyalty

Understanding what makes your customers tick helps you turn moderately satisfied buyers into loyal advocates of your business. Here’s how.

By identifying emotional triggers, you can create targeted campaigns around topics they feel strongly about, respond more effectively to feedback and keep delighting customers at every step of the journey.

Screenshot of Sprout Social responding to a Tweet that mentions its brand with a positive sentiment.

Not only will customers have a great experience with your brand, they’ll appreciate you going the extra mile to exceed their expectations and bring them joy. As a result, you’ll reduce churn and keep them coming back for more.

Identify product and service gaps

Monitoring customer sentiment can highlight areas of your product or service that may need improvement or innovation.

For example, you might notice complaints on social media about the poor battery life of your tech product. You could roll out an update to fix the issue and potentially avert a drop in sales. Better yet, you could focus on improving the battery of your future products.

How to measure customer sentiment

You know sentiment analysis is important, but how do you actually do it? How do you measure the general emotion surrounding your brand?

It might sound complicated, but it’s really not. You just need to gather the right data and organize it in a way that makes it easier to interpret and act upon.

Which factors contribute to customer sentiment?

Before we get to the steps, let’s find out what type of data you need to measure customer sentiment about your brand. Here are some factors that affect sentiment:

  • Customer reviews: Online reviews of your company, products and services contain various emotions expressed via text and/or visuals. They can be positive, negative or neutral, and these nuances are often picked up by AI sentiment analysis tools. Managing these reviews with productive solutions can help your brand improve trust among customers and lower the negative impact of online criticism.
Screenshot of Sprout Social’s listening tool gathering customer reviews from TripAdvisor for topic mining and sentiment analysis.
  • Brand reputation: On social media, every like, comment or post shapes your brand’s public perception. A viral post can make you popular, while a critical tweet can spark backlash. It’s an up-to-date snapshot of how much people like or dislike your brand.
  • News: Whether it’s an award, a product recall or a CEO’s statement, news can significantly impact how customers perceive a brand.
  • Marketing initiatives: When your campaigns resonate, they lift positive sentiment; when they miss the mark, they can confuse or even alienate your audience.
  • Cognitive dissonance: When customers’ experiences don’t align with their expectations, it creates discomfort known as cognitive dissonance. This psychological phenomenon can lead to negative sentiment if not addressed.
  • Competitive landscape: Customers always compare, and so your standing in the market—your prices, quality, innovation—all contribute to how they feel about your brand in the context of your competition.
Screenshot of Sprout Social’s competitor analysis performance report showing metrics on various KPIs including topic summary, share of voice, total engagements and sentiment scores based on positive, negative and neutral emotions found in the data.

These drivers can all influence how customers feel about a brand, and it’s important to track them all in order to get a complete picture of customer sentiment.

3 steps to analyze customer sentiment

Now you know what to look for. But how do you go about analyzing this data? Follow the three steps below for a systematic and organized approach to conducting sentiment analysis:

Step 1: Gather the data

First, you need raw material to work with—that means collecting brand-related information from every corner where your customers might express their thoughts.

This could range from online reviews and social media posts to customer support tickets and survey responses. Gathering diverse data sources gives you a well-rounded view of customer sentiment, not just isolated snapshots.

Step 2: Process the data

Next, you’ll need to sift through the data and prepare it for analysis.

This is where sentiment analysis tools can help. AI-powered algorithms can sort positive from negative, and suss out those tricky neutral comments.

This step involves decoding the tone and intent behind words, which requires sophisticated technology, like natural language processing (NLP), to capture subtleties and context.

Step 3: Visualize the data

Finally, you’ve got to make sense of all this information. Data visualization tools can transform your findings into charts, graphs and heat maps that highlight sentiment trends.

This step is crucial because it translates complex data into a format that’s easy for teams to understand and use, turning insights into action points for improving customer experience.

Best tools for customer sentiment analysis

Measuring customer sentiment can be tricky as it’s not exactly a quantifiable metric.

Thankfully, there are some powerful sentiment analysis tools out there to help you navigate the complexities in gauging customer experience and extracting actionable insights.

Here are three sentiment analysis tools you can use:

Sprout Social

Sprout Social is an all-in-one social media management platform that offers sentiment analysis as part of its AI-powered social listening capabilities.

Screenshot of Sprout Social's Listening feature that reports sentiment analysis and sentiment trends based on AI-powered social listening.

Refine your strategy by exploring customers’ feelings, thoughts and opinions on specific topics, competitors, products and more. Sprout gives you a visual score summarizing the average sentiment around your brand as well as a graph tracking sentiment trends over time.

Lexalytics

Lexalytics is a text analytics platform that helps you analyze sentiment by examining customer feedback across multiple channels. It evaluates the tone and emotion in the text to determine the sentiment behind customer opinions.

MeaningCloud

MeaningCloud offers sentiment analysis by processing multilingual content from various channels. It breaks down feedback into sentiments associated with specific topics or attributes of your products and services.

How to improve customer sentiment

Analyzing sentiment is just the beginning. You also need to know how to make customers fall in love with your brand.

Improving customer sentiment requires a strategic approach to evaluating customer experience and taking advantage of AI customer service tools. Here’s what to do:

Define the scope

Before you can improve sentiment, you need to know where to listen. Are your customers voicing their opinions on X (formerly Twitter), reviewing on Google or asking questions on live chat?

Pinpoint these channels and decide if there are specific regions or languages that need attention. For instance, if your product is hitting a new market, you’ll want to tune into that area’s local review sites and social platforms.

Defining the scope provides a targeted area for your efforts so you don’t cast too wide a net and dilute your impact.

Monitor the sentiment

Next, use sentiment analysis tools to continuously monitor these channels.

By tracking sentiment over time, you can spot trends and understand how customers are reacting to every little change.

For example, if sentiment dips every time you release a software update, there’s a clue to improve your change management process.

Identify the topics or themes

Leverage AI to dig into the feedback to find what’s really stirring up emotions. Is it your stellar customer service, or perhaps shipping delays are causing grief?

Identifying these topics helps you know where to double down and where to pivot. For example, if multiple customers express frustration over a specific product feature, that’s a clear signal you need to make improvements.

Create a strategy

Finally, develop a strategy based on these insights. Allocate your resources where they’ll make the biggest difference. Maybe it’s time to staff up your customer service team or invest in an AI chatbot to provide instant responses.

Also, determine the best channels for customer interaction—perhaps your audience engages more on Instagram than email—and tailor your approach accordingly.

Remember to train your team so they understand the importance of sentiment and how to nurture positive experiences at every touchpoint.

Using sentiment analysis to improve customer experience

What your customers think about your business directly influences its growth and success. Instead of just reading reviews, you need to dive deeper and understand the nuances of emotion to accurately monitor sentiment around your brand.

With customer sentiment analysis, you can get inside your customers’ minds, leverage emotional triggers and craft experiences that delight them at every step.

Sprout Social’s listening lets you track customer sentiment, conversations, behavior and trends across multiple social media platforms with the power of AI and machine learning.

Interested in learning more? Schedule a personalized demo and learn how to drive real business growth with Sprout’s platform.

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]]> Your guide to social media comments: How to post and respond https://sproutsocial.com/insights/social-media-comments/ https://sproutsocial.com/insights/social-media-comments/#respond Tue, 07 Nov 2023 15:43:53 +0000 https://sproutsocial.com/insights/?p=147864/ Social media is all about engaging and interacting with your audience. This means when your followers and customers leave social media comments on your Read more...

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]]> Social media is all about engaging and interacting with your audience. This means when your followers and customers leave social media comments on your posts with enquiries, complaints or compliments, it’s best practice to respond to them as soon as you can to show appreciation for their business.

But every social network is different, their user demographic is unique and not all comments, such as trolling, deserve responses. Knowing how to interact with audiences on different social platforms and respond to various kinds of comments is crucial to a successful social communications strategy.

In this guide, we help you navigate through different approaches for a variety of social comments and show you the best way to respond to them.

Why responding to social media comments is important

According to The Sprout Social Index™ 2023, 51% of surveyed consumers say the most memorable brands on social respond to customers. It’s no surprise that prompt responses also help nurture customer loyalty and elevate brand satisfaction.

Data visualization from The Sprout Social Index™ 2023 that states 51% of surveyed consumers say the most memorable brands on social respond to customers.

Further, 68% of customers follow brands on social to stay informed about new products and services, another 46% look for exclusive deals and promotions. That’s why responding to queries diligently and providing relevant responses can lead to better sales conversions.

A Sprout Social Index 2023™ infographic highlighting the type of content consumers want to see on social from brands and why they follow these brands. The top factor is information on products and services.

Positive comments feel great and give you a chance to further boost your brand reputation. And, while nobody likes negative comments, they have the potential to give you in-depth insights into your brand strategy so you can prioritize areas that need improvement to enhance customer satisfaction.

Similarly, responding to neutral comments is a great way to let customers know you hear them and are in tune with them. This fosters closeness and nurtures your brand community.

With this in mind, let’s get to know different types of social comments and how to approach them.

How to handle different types of social media comments

Social media comments can oscillate between positive and negative emotions but you can’t afford to ignore either because they’re vital to your conversions. According to a Q4 2023 Sprout Pulse Survey of 1,623 consumers, 65% of customers reach out to brands on social with questions about products and services before making a purchase. The way you respond can impact a potential sale. These comments are important for tracking brand sentiment as well so you know how audiences perceive your brand.

Here’s a look at how to handle different types of comments common in social media marketing.

1. Positive comments or feedback

Responding to positive comments is an important part of building and maintaining a positive brand image. When a customer thanks you or shows appreciation, it’s best practice to reciprocate the feeling.

Be sincere in your response, thank them for their time and remember to personalize your message. These gestures show how much you value and appreciate their feedback. It also helps build a sense of trust and community.

A screenshot showing an example of a positive comment from a post on X (formerly Twitter) from Dreamforce that says, “so grateful you were with us this week! Pretty dreamy, huh? To which Sprout Social replied,” Incredibly dreamy, friends.”

2. Neutral comments

Neutral comments can be tricky because you may think they don’t require a response. Yet, responding to such comments builds brand loyalty because it shows you’re listening to your audience and available whenever they need you to be. It also gives you an opportunity to engage with your audiences in a fun way.

A screenshot of a neutral comment from a post on X. The customer has taken a picture of themselves with a RedBull can in their hand and captioned it “good morning. RedBull responded to the post and wrote, “good morning”.

3. Negative comments

Negative comments can be about a range of issues revolving around products and customer care. Responding to such comments with tact and empathy is vital to maintain brand health. A respectful, calm and personalized approach can turn a disgruntled customer into a happy one, and potentially earn repeat business.

An example of a negative post on X. The customer wrote, “Is it too much to ask @LGUS to build appliances that last longer than a year." LG US responded with an empathetic response and said they wanted to know more details so they could help. The post was signed off personally by a staff member.

While some negative comments may be general complaints, some need to be handled more carefully so they don’t escalate. It’s best practice to have an escalation management protocol in place to handle such cases smoothly so they don’t turn into bigger issues. More on that later.

Analyzing sentiment in social media comments

By measuring brand sentiment from positive, negative and neutral social media comments, you can monitor and analyze how the market perceives your brand in real-time. This helps you proactively track brand health and take corrective measures where needed. Sentiment analysis insights also enable you to spot your strengths and weaknesses to inform product and business strategies for more holistic growth.

A screenshot of the sentiment summary in Sprout's social listening solution. In the middle of the report is a chart that shows how much positive and negative sentiment there is for the brand. On the right side of the report are messages and their assigned sentiment type. This empowers you to explore what messages and customer feedback is impacting your brand's sentiment.

For example, Sprout’s AI-driven sentiment analysis capability enables you to analyze sentiment in keywords and hashtags across social platforms like Instagram, Twitter and YouTube to understand customer satisfaction so you can improve their experience. You can also get a competitor comparison of key performance metrics across social networks such as engagement, impressions, share of voice and user sentiment all in a unified stream.

A screenshot of Sprout Social's Competitive Analysis dashboard that demonstrates how three competitors compare in share of voice, impressions, engagements and sentiment.

Conversational analytics from social media comments further let you dig into social chatter about you and your competitors. It helps you monitor competing brands and spot market trends and topics that interest your audience.

A screenshot showing Sprout Social's Facebook Competitors Report where you can view key metrics of your profiles compared to your competitor average.

Navigating responses to tough comments

There’s a difference between negative comments and hate speech—comments that aggressively attack a brand or an individual. Similarly, common complaints like late deliveries or late customer care responses are not the same as those that can turn into a potential PR problem. These need to be handled differently.

Offensive comments and hate speech

In such cases, it is important to maintain calm and professional candor and remember that trolling is meant to provoke and upset. You must set boundaries for inappropriate behavior and make it clear that dehumanizing language, personal attacks, hate speech and offensive language are not acceptable. You may also block the person and report it on the social network.

Comments related to a crisis

Social media comments related to a crisis may cause serious repercussions to your brand and require a comprehensive crisis communication plan. It’s necessary to handle issues that could adversely affect your reputation with a potential PR or legal backlash. Being prepared with a social strategy to manage a crisis helps you jump into action immediately while ensuring you’re following your company’s legal and brand protocols.

In such cases, it’s important to keep records of interactions and feedback garnered from social comments and DMs. Document screenshots of relevant comment threads and send them to your HR, legal and other stakeholders as required so everyone is on the same page. This is necessary to develop an effective plan to handle the situation successfully. Using Sprout, you can also create a unique Tag to label DMs and posts that fall into this category. Then you can use Tag reporting to simplify how you share information with those across the organization.

How to respond to social media comments

Every social media network is unique by way of its demographic and how customers use it to interact with brands, especially for customer service. Audiences use social for customer care because they can reach a brand instantly while, according to McKinsey, brands benefit from being able to provide higher customer satisfaction at lower costs. That’s why mastering how to respond to comments on different social networks is essential to enhancing customer experience.

Let’s look at how responding to comments organically works on each social network.

1. Facebook

Facebook remains a thriving social network where audiences go to discover and engage with content that resonates and to stay updated on the latest trends. It’s also where people go to interact with a brand and in return expect brands to engage with them authentically.

In a fast-paced world where customers are spoilt for choice, being attentive to your customers is key to building lasting relationships. Whether it’s a positive, negative or neutral comment, responding to them builds genuine connections and lets your customers know you appreciate them.

A screenshot of positive comments on a Wendy's post. The customer commented on the ad and wrote, "I'm eating Wendy's right now." To which, Wendy's replied, "Our day just got better."

To make sure you don’t miss a comment, click Inbox in the left sidebar of your Facebook Page manager. Access comments from there and click Reply to respond.

Facebook's inbox showcasing comments on posts

2. X (formerly known as Twitter)

Customers love X for its real-time, bite-sized content format that allows for quick and easy conversations. That’s one of the reasons why it’s so popular forcustomer service. Customers voice their concerns with brands, share opinions and engage in discussions freely, and before you know it, there’s a trending hashtag.

When you respond to social media comments on X, it’s important to remember that they’re visible to all and there may be others following your conversation. You must be timely and polite, even when facing complaints. This gives you an opportunity to highlight your brand personality and elevate brand perception by showing how gracefully you handle customer issues.

A screenshot of a customer complaint on X to which Nike Basketball responded respectfully and asked the customer to send them a private message with their member email and order number.

To respond to a mention onX, click on the comment bubble icon at the bottom of the post. A pop-up will appear for you to type out your response. Click Reply to write your message and Send.

Twitter's notifications tab that gives options like Home, #Explore, Notification, Messages and others.

3. Instagram

Customers often use Instagram to browse products, ask clarifying questions and make purchases. In fact, Instagram is built to encourage purchases. The network’s Product Tags feature enables you to highlight your products directly in your videos and posts so customers find them easily and get all the information they need. Here is where they might also be interested to know more about specific products or deals. That’s why monitoring and responding to comments on Instagram regularly is important for your brand.

Apart from being prompt in your responses, it’s also ideal you show interest in customers by acknowledging neutral comments. This nudges customers to consider your brand during a purchase, nurtures your relationship with them and builds your reputation as a brand that’s appreciative of its followers.

To view your Instagram notifications, tap the heart icon in the top right corner of your app. Click on the comments you want to respond to and you’ll automatically see the post. Tap Reply to respond to the comment. If you want to leave a response on someone else’s post, tap the comment bubble icon directly below the photo and you’ll reach the comments page. Type your comment and tap Post to send.

A screenshot of an Instagram comment section where a customer is leaving a message.

4. LinkedIn

Responding to social media comments on LinkedIn is different from other social channels. Since it’s a platform geared toward professionals, you need to respond in a friendly but formal manner. Acknowledge comments by liking them and express your thoughts succinctly in your response.

A screenshot from comments on a LinkedIn post where users and brands both interact in a friendly but formal manner.

To comment on LinkedIn posts, click on the Comment option under the post and type your message in the box that appears. To reply to someone else’s comment on your post, open the post, click on the comments and tap on Reply to respond.

A screenshot of LinkedIn that shows comment options under the post where you can type your message in the box.

5. Pinterest

People use Pinterest as a visual search engine and often draw inspiration or discover new products. In fact, 80% of weekly users have found a new product or brand on the network. While commenting may not be as common as other interactions on the platform, audiences can see comments that have been left on their Pins.

Use this opportunity to provide relevant information and answer queries about your products and respond to feedback.

How to respond to Pinterest comments

To view comments left on your pins, click on the megaphone icon. Click Reply underneath the comment to leave your response and tap Enter. To leave comments on other Pins, open the Pin, click Comments and type in a message.

How to leave a comment on a pin

6. TikTok

TikTok is a fun social network to bring out your creativity and boost your brand presence, audience reach and engagement. The best part? You can experiment with different types of content and don’t have to be formal while interacting with customers. Choose how you want to write in keeping with your brand voice, keeping it light and friendly.

That said, TikTok comments are great for understanding what your audience wants and expects from you. Monitor conversations and engage with your followers to keep up with audience sentiment and see what aspects of your brand are most popular with them.

@abercrombie

We tried our (personal) best. #YPB #Abercrombie #AbercrombieActive #NewAbercrombie #Yoga #Namaste #fyp

♬ Losing my mind FAIL – Jason Derulo

To view comments on a video, tap the comment bubble icon on the right side of your screen and reply to the comment and a a Reply to [username] text box will appear.

How to respond to TikTok comments

Streamline social media comments with Sprout Social’s Smart Inbox

Monitoring and engaging with social media comments on all your different social channels can be a daunting task. Sprout’s Smart Inbox enables you to unify all your social streams into a single source of truth so you easily monitor incoming messages, quickly respond to audiences and efficiently manage conversations.

It enables you to prioritize messages by tagging, filtering and hiding completed messages in your inbox so you don’t miss out on a single comment. Review your messages to find the most urgent ones and respond to comments across platforms from one app. Plus monitor keywords, hashtags and locations to discover unique engagement opportunities.

Start managing your social media comments

An​​ effective communication plan to engage and respond to social media comments empowers you to build your brand, foster brand loyalty and connect with the right audience. Boost your brand reputation where it counts and navigate critical moments that can adversely affect your brand. Check out our social communications plan template to plan for all possible scenarios on social and tackle your social strategy more efficiently.

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